Israeli forces left Gaza, but the Palestinian terrorists kept firing their rockets. Is this the problem of groups not heeding the word or the initial stages? Then again, Hamas was busy firing the rockets itself right up to the deadline.
The agreement also called for Palestinians to stop their own attacks at 6 a.m. Sunday. But rocket and mortar fire from Gaza continued to strike southern Israel.Interesting that Abbas would try to stop the rocket fire, considering that the PA is outnumbered by Hamas in Gaza. The PA is unwilling to stop the rocket fire for fear of starting a civil war with Hamas.
“Let’s hope that’s just the problems of the beginning,” The Associated Press quoted an Israeli government spokeswoman, Miri Eisin, as saying. “But if Israel is attacked, we will respond. If there are Palestinian factions that are not part of the cease-fire, it’s hard to see how the cease-fire will hold.”
[Israel’s prime minister, Ehud Olmert, said Sunday that Israel will “show restraint,” Reuters reported.
[The Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, on Sunday ordered his security forces to try to prevent rocket fire, news agencies reported, but it was not clear what action the forces would take.]
The accord is the most serious effort to end the fighting in Gaza. However, it is not clear how widely it will be embraced by Palestinian militants. In the past, the Palestinian Authority has been unable or unwilling to control the numerous factions involved in the fighting with Israel.
But after meeting in Gaza with several Palestinian factions involved in firing rockets into Israel, the Palestinian prime minister, Ismail Haniya of Hamas, said Saturday that they had agreed to abide by the cease-fire.
Shortly before the deadline Sunday morning, Hamas fired three rockets at the southern Israeli town of Sderot, it told Reuters. One landed in the city, damaging a home but causing no injuries, the Israeli military said.
Oh, and the ceasefire doesn't cover the West Bank, which means that the fighting may shift there should the terrorists want to start a third front against Israel.
Olmert is urging restraint and will not respond to the rocket attacks occurring now. I'm sorry, but if it's a violation of the agreement, then the agreement should be null and void, and will be seen as weakness on the part of the Israelis to respond to the violence directed at them. The next round of rockets will be that much deadlier and more intense. The Palestinians are simply ratcheting up the level of violence directed at the Israelis - all with the goal not of creating a separate state for Palestinians, but to supplant Israel altogether. The suicide bombers talk of how Jews stole holy Islamic lands. Never mind the fact that the land was holy to Jews before the Muslims took it themselves, or that the Islamists are rewriting history to write the Jews out of the picture altogether (just as the Islamists do wherever they want to claim the land as their own). Muslims have tried to fight and beat Israel in numerous wars, losing all of them. So, they whine, seethe, and will engage in suicide bombings and rocket attacks hoping to destroy the will of Israel to defend itself over the years.
Oh, and the suicide bomber isn't poor - he's middle class attending the local Palestinian university. Once again, another myth dispelled about how the terrorists are poor and this is about a wealth divide. It's about a religious divide - the Islamists want to eliminate threats to their religion - destroying Israel would be a step in that path. He talks of what happened in Jenin in 2002, when Israel engaged in house to house fighting that resulted in 52 killed, though Arafat claimed a massacre of epic proportions. This bomber believes the propaganda, and has no reason not to - there's no one within the Palestinian community willing to do that. So, the Palestinians embrace a false history, complete with falsehoods that are repeated ad nauseum until they become truths.
He also says that the Israelis will target truce violators. Well, how exactly is that any different than the current situation without a truce? The Palestinians try to kill Israelis and launch rockets, and the Israelis are trying to eliminate the rocket threat, eliminating the terrorists who launch them.
Meanwhile, the Israeli courts have approved the Jerusalem barrier, which will be built because the security considerations outweigh the claims of the Arab residents.
UPDATE:
Fixed location of technorati tags. Meanwhile, Meryl Yourish slams Olmert for not showing more gumption in going after the terrorists who continue to fire rockets into Israel. That means recognizing that the Palestinians violated their own truce and do not deserve its protections. That the Palestinians called for this truce shows that they've been hurt badly by the Israeli attacks into Gaza, and they need time to regroup and rearm. Israel should deny them this capability. The media outlets are already trying to downplay the rocket attacks and Palestinian violations, despite the fact that they're ongoing.
Powerline and Jules Crittenden also comments on the situation.
The latest rocket attacks were claimed by PIJ, which said the rockets were in response to Israeli raids in the West Bank, which was not covered by any ceasefire agreement. This goes to the heart of the situation. The terrorists will always invent real or perceived grievances in order to attack Israelis while Israel, meanwhile, must be constrained from acting to defend itself. The Palestinians do not want to abide by any ceasefire agreement, but will demand that Israel must hold to the letter of the agreement or else face more terrorist attacks (which are already in the planning and operational stages).
Ed Morrissey notes that the Palestinians have restarted the triangle offense so that the terror attacks can continue while paying lip service to the notion of a hudna. Carl in Jerusalem notes that Israel ceases, and the Palestinians fire.
Just so we know who we're talking about here, the Palestinians are coming up with cuter ways to kill and maim people - namely stuffing explosives into plush dolls.
Others blogging: Blog-o-Fascists, LGF, Israelated, Greetings from the French Hill, and Jihad Watch.
Technorati: terrorism, nasrallah, fatah, Gilad, Shalit, Olmert, Eliyahu, Abbas, Regev, Goldwasser, PRC, Hamas, Gaza, palestinian, Israel, hizbullah, hezbullah, hezbollah, lebanon, syria.
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